How is the day of the Dalai Lama

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

The Dalai Lama - the spiritual leader of the Tibetan people - is a household name for everything related to calmness, wisdom and kindness. However, the Dalai Lama is a title, and the one who wears it is the same person as anyone else. We decided to find out how the day of one of the main representatives of Buddhism is built.

In the book, writer Pico Iyer recounts how the 14th Dalai Lama begins each day:

At nine in the morning, the Dalai Lama had already finished his four-hour meditation. Getting up at 4:30, the first thing he did was spend four hours in prayer and thinking about what he could do for his people.

Pico Iyer

This meditation serves as a means of understanding the world for the Dalai Lama and other Buddhists. With its help, they explore the laws of the universe and try to understand what can and cannot be done with them. For Iyer, who spent a lot of time with the Tibetan leader, it was a challenge to understand his culture. He describes him as a "spiritual doctor" - so, in his words, the easiest way to understand who the Dalai Lama is.

After meditation, the Dalai Lama starts reading and watching the news. Trying to keep the information diet, he listens to only a few selected programs in order to keep abreast of the latest events: BBC East Asian broadcast, Voice of America. Reads mainly The Times and Newsweek.

“In the age of the Internet,” writes Iyer, “anyone who wants to get our attention tries to tell a compelling story, often supplying it with fictional details. Well, if this is so, it also happens otherwise - when the story is fictional from beginning to end."

The Dalai Lama does the opposite:

The Dalai Lama comes and tells each of us that he is real. As real as his country. He, too, can have illness, grief and misfortune. He does not consider the Tibetans to be good and the Chinese to be bad, calling both potentially good.

After breakfast (oatmeal, tsampa and tea) he reads. Most often Buddhist texts and books. Then it is time for the reception, and from 12:30 to 15:30 the Dalai Lama talks with the people who come to him. It is worth noting that the XIV Dalai Lama says how little he eats. Apart from breakfast and lunch, the only mention of food is tea at five in the evening. A few more hours are devoted to various interviews, and after 17:00 he goes to evening prayers, and by 7 in the evening he goes to rest.